Weigh­ing the risk

A large Dan­ish study has sug­gested birth con­trol pills moderately raise the risk of breast can­cer, es­pe­cially with long-term use. But the over­all in­creased risk was small, amount­ing to one ex­tra case of breast can­cer among 7700 women us­ing con­tra­cep­tives per year. Re­searchers couldn’t rule out a risk for other hor­monal con­tra­cep­tives such as the patch and im­plant.